A Raspberry Pi as a music server

[0bs3rv3r]

I don't understand the 'native interface' thing - they all mainly use a web interface.

The material skin plugin, is, well, a plugin, i.e. not part of the original program. Often this can mean compromises have to be made compared to something written and integrated into the system fully.

 

[0bs3rv3r]

Moode also never crashed, the web interface is good when used with a standard PC and also with a mobile phone.

This has been my experience as well. Volumio used to crash, but I am sure they have fixed it by now.

 

[Pep2020]

The material skin plugin, is, well, a plugin, i.e. not part of the original program. Often this can mean compromises have to be made compared to something written and integrated into the system fully.

I have the material skin plugin installed but the squeeze ctrl app is much better. Personally think it is better than the moode or volumio web front ends also. They may have improved since I last used though. Moode was particularly difficult to control from a smartphone.

 

[Tom C]

My friends, I got my Pi about a year and a half ago. I’ve loaded RaspberryOS, JRiver, Kodi, Volumio, all up and running. @mdsimon2 put together a beautiful step by step tutorial on setting up Ubuntu server with CamillsDSP that was flawless. after cutting my teeth on the others, the single most thrilling part of Camilla was having the wireless headless setup launch on first trial. Suweet!
You need background to be able to work in the Linux world without stumbling. It’s just a fact of life. Some small missed detail can send a piker like me into a week long tailspin.
I don’t doubt for a moment that you all got it running tout de suite. And if I spend enough time, it will eventually work for me. But the instructions provided by pCP are, to my thinking, inadequate.

 

[MCH]

My friends, I got my Pi about a year and a half ago. I’ve loaded RaspberryOS, JRiver, Kodi, Volumio, all up and running. @mdsimon2 put together a beautiful step by step tutorial on setting up Ubuntu server with CamillsDSP that was flawless. after cutting my teeth on the others, the single most thrilling part of Camilla was having the wireless headless setup launch on first trial. Suweet!
You need background to be able to work in the Linux world without stumbling. It’s just a fact of life. Some small missed detail can send a piker like me into a week long tailspin.
I don’t doubt for a moment that you all got it running tout de suite. And if I spend enough time, it will eventually work for me. But the instructions provided by pCP are, to my thinking, inadequate.

My experience with pcp/lms is just the opposite: when i first used it (i wanted to stream an analog input, so not something that is perfectly described in the instructions), i started to press everywhere and change stuff without knowing what i was doing, and didn't manage to make it stop working

 

[kchap]

My experience with pcp/lms is just the opposite: when i first used it (i wanted to stream an analog input, so not something that is perfectly described in the instructions), i started to press everywhere and change stuff without knowing what i was doing, and didn't manage to make it stop working

Rules for going "Off-Piste" with Rpi. Follow the instructions to load your OS/APP. Get the basics working. Power down and remove flash. Make a copy of the flash using Win32 Imager or similar. Re-insert the flash and see if you can get the next bit to work. Make a copy of the flash at each stage.

Speaking from bitter experience I wish I was better at following my own rules.

 

[Tom C]

The balenaEtcher worked. I tried that one sometime ago, trying to burn Buster (it was the latest at the time), before the Raspberry folks came out with their own imager. The Balena didn’t work that first time I tried it, and the Raspberry one came out shortly after, and worked well for everything I tried it with up to now. So this time Balena worked and Raspberry didn’t.

 

[somebodyelse]

I don’t doubt for a moment that you all got it running tout de suite. And if I spend enough time, it will eventually work for me. But the instructions provided by pCP are, to my thinking, inadequate.

The balenaEtcher worked. I tried that one sometime ago, trying to burn Buster (it was the latest at the time), before the Raspberry folks came out with their own imager. The Balena didn’t work that first time I tried it, and the Raspberry one came out shortly after, and worked well for everything I tried it with up to now. So this time Balena worked and Raspberry didn’t.

There's a balancing act going on with the instructions. They've gone for the short and simple approach that works for most people most of the time, while alluding to some of the myriad problems that can occur with particular combinations of OS, browser, settings and software versions. The other extreme would be to document every known complication, but then the instructions would be so long and complicated that very few would read them, let alone try following them. An in between option would be to go into a bit more detail about the most common pitfalls, or have a separate troubleshooting page, but it needs someone to volunteer to pull together the known problems and write this. It's not as if anyone's getting paid to do this.

Your problem with Balena Etcher illustrates one aspect of the difficulty - from time to time people start reporting problems when using a tool that was formerly considered reliable, and separating out why it's not working for them can be difficult. Most just want something that works, and don't want to do the work necessary to track down the root cause, including simple things like which version they used and where they downloaded it from. After a bit the reports stop - you have an apparently reliable tool again, and you don't know the specifics of what made it unreliable. Balena Etcher on Windows has been through this a couple of times over the last couple of years, at least for writing uSD cards for the PinePhone (another linux board, same image writing process), and that's with a more technically proficient audience than piCorePlayer.

 

[Tom C]

There's a balancing act going on with the instructions. They've gone for the short and simple approach that works for most people most of the time, while alluding to some of the myriad problems that can occur with particular combinations of OS, browser, settings and software versions. The other extreme would be to document every known complication, but then the instructions would be so long and complicated that very few would read them, let alone try following them. An in between option would be to go into a bit more detail about the most common pitfalls, or have a separate troubleshooting page, but it needs someone to volunteer to pull together the known problems and write this. It's not as if anyone's getting paid to do this.

Your problem with Balena Etcher illustrates one aspect of the difficulty - from time to time people start reporting problems when using a tool that was formerly considered reliable, and separating out why it's not working for them can be difficult. Most just want something that works, and don't want to do the work necessary to track down the root cause, including simple things like which version they used and where they downloaded it from. After a bit the reports stop - you have an apparently reliable tool again, and you don't know the specifics of what made it unreliable. Balena Etcher on Windows has been through this a couple of times over the last couple of years, at least for writing uSD cards for the PinePhone (another linux board, same image writing process), and that's with a more technically proficient audience than piCorePlayer.

Yes, I understand that this is a labor of love for a number of people, and it amounts to a free gift to whomever wishes to use it. As we used to say, what do you want for nothing, your money back?
The rather sad reality is that many of these free software solutions are often as good as, or better than, the paid solutions, sometimes offering functionality that is otherwise unavailable.

 

[atx1969]

Hello All:
I am new to the group and I am sorry if my question was covered before, but I cant find and answer to my specific situation
Goal: My goal is to stream to a Raspberry P1 4 using Tidal Master content (Typically 96 KHz sample rate for master recordings) and use my Topping D10 as DAC
As an OS in the RPi I am using Volumio 3 (latest version) with Premium subscription, as I heard it works flawless for my above goal
Issue: The D10 DAC displays the sample rate is receiving. When I play a master recorded song in Tidal the Volumio app and the DAC display shows 44.1 as opposed to 96. As a test I connected the DAC directly to my computer (skipping RPi) via USB and it does show correctly as 96khz for the same song
So looks like the RPi working with Volumio is limited to 44.1 (some times 48) but definitely not 96 which defeats the purpose of using the Tidal Hi-Fi Plus to play master quality songs. From my test connecting via USB I can see that is not an issue with Tidal or the DAC so its must be the Raspberry Pi-Volumio combination.
So my question is , is my above assumption about the limitation accurate or is a setup issue.
I would add that I am open to use any other OS besides Volumio to be able to reach my goal so any other recommendation is very appreciated
Thanks in advance for your help!

 

[Madeintooting]

So my question is , is my above assumption about the limitation accurate or is a setup issue.

Try accessing your pc from Volumio (Mount Drive) and play the file.
Or if you have plex on the pc it will show in volumio as a server.

Both pi and volumio shouldn't have a problem with 24/96.

 

[0bs3rv3r]

I use moOde on a pi, and run my DAC at 32bit/384kHz for all local playback. Volumio is very similar. Maybe it's a Tidal software thing.

 

[ahofer]

Hello All:
I am new to the group and I am sorry if my question was covered before, but I cant find and answer to my specific situation
Goal: My goal is to stream to a Raspberry P1 4 using Tidal Master content (Typically 96 KHz sample rate for master recordings) and use my Topping D10 as DAC
As an OS in the RPi I am using Volumio 3 (latest version) with Premium subscription, as I heard it works flawless for my above goal
Issue: The D10 DAC displays the sample rate is receiving. When I play a master recorded song in Tidal the Volumio app and the DAC display shows 44.1 as opposed to 96. As a test I connected the DAC directly to my computer (skipping RPi) via USB and it does show correctly as 96khz for the same song
So looks like the RPi working with Volumio is limited to 44.1 (some times 48) but definitely not 96 which defeats the purpose of using the Tidal Hi-Fi Plus to play master quality songs. From my test connecting via USB I can see that is not an issue with Tidal or the DAC so its must be the Raspberry Pi-Volumio combination.
So my question is , is my above assumption about the limitation accurate or is a setup issue.
I would add that I am open to use any other OS besides Volumio to be able to reach my goal so any other recommendation is very appreciated
Thanks in advance for your help!

Tidal Masters are MQA, delivered in 48k files and then ”unfolded” in the DAC for 96K. You wouldn’t see a higher nitrate outside of an MQA-ready DAC (or Roon), and maybe not then (but you would see “MQA”).This is what I see with a Tidal master in Roon:

 

[atx1969]

Tidal Masters are MQA, delivered in 48k files and then ”unfolded” in the DAC for 96K. You wouldn’t see a higher nitrate outside of an MQA-ready DAC (or Roon), and maybe not then (but you would see “MQA”).This is what I see with a Tidal master in Roon:

Thanks for your feedback, that is actually my theory, that my DAC doesn't support the MQA format. The part that I don't understand is why when I connect with an USB cable from the PC to the same DAC that doesn't support MQA I do get the 96khz. Is the PC doing the unfolding by itself? I haven't downloaded any driver or anything, that is strange isn't it??

 

[atx1969]

Tidal Masters are MQA, delivered in 48k files and then ”unfolded” in the DAC for 96K. You wouldn’t see a higher nitrate outside of an MQA-ready DAC (or Roon), and maybe not then (but you would see “MQA”).This is what I see with a Tidal master in Roon:

View attachment 185955

And to make sure you have a MQA DAC right? so even if I use roon instead of Voumio I would have the same issue

 

[ahofer]

Thanks for your feedback, that is actually my theory, that my DAC doesn't support the MQA format. The part that I don't understand is why when I connect with an USB cable from the PC to the same DAC that doesn't support MQA I do get the 96khz. Is the PC doing the unfolding by itself? I haven't downloaded any driver or anything, that is strange isn't it??

In my setup, Roon (the software) is doing the unfolding. What player are you using, and could it be MQA-compatible? Or is it simply upsampling, rather than unfolding?

 

[ahofer]

And to make sure you have a MQA DAC right? so even if I use roon instead of Voumio I would have the same issue

No. Roon takes care of it.

 

[atx1969]

In my setup, Roon (the software) is doing the unfolding. What player are you using, and could it be MQA-compatible? Or is it simply upsampling, rather than unfolding?

I think I figured it out, when I connect my D10 DAC to the PC I use the Tidal connect which has a setup to have the app control the sample rate and to "disable the software that decodes MQA" which then means that the app is doing the MQA decoding and not the DAC. In this case I get 96.0 on the DAC display.
But the problem is that neither Volumio nor the Tidal Connect app have the option to decode MQA.
So based on my setup looks like I either change the DAC to the E50 which can unfold MQA or use Roon instead.
I kind of leaning to replace the dac is about 160 more than the D10 here in the US and has a better ESS dac and it goes up to 32/768
Would you agree? How happy are you with roon ?

 

[Thorskin]

Is there anyway to use a single RPi (i have the RPi3b) with an Allo Boss v1.2 DAC for Tidal (with Tidal connect) + Kodi for watching movies?

My goal is to have 3 configurations for my setup.

RPi (Tidal) + 2.0 Genelecs for music

RPi (Kodi) + TV + 2.0 Genelecs for everyday TV (stereo)

HTPC + AVR + TV + 5.1 Genelecs (to AVR preouts) for Surround Home theatre movie night (rarely watched)

I would use 1 or 2 Schitt Sys preamps to switch between configurations

My current set up is the third option (HTPC+AVR) for everything but energy prices are going up up up so I'm hoping to switch to something with a much lower power consumption for 247 everyday use and only use my HTPC+AVR on the occasions when we want the full experience.

 

[somebodyelse]

I think Volumio is currently the only legit Tidal Connect method for the Pi, but that doesn't do Kodi. You could look into dual booting options for ways to select Volumio or which ever kodi distro when you power up the Pi.